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271 points mithcs | 1 comments | 17 Nov 25 10:40 UTC | HN request time: 0s | source

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khaledh ◴[17 Nov 25 13:25 UTC] No.45953354[source]▶

The problem with macro-laden C is that your code becomes foreign and opaque to others. You're building a new mini-language layer on top of the base language that only your codebase uses. This has been my experience with many large C projects: I see tons of macros used all over the place and I have no idea what they do unless I hunt down and understand each one of them.

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1. naasking ◴[17 Nov 25 14:32 UTC] No.45953891[source]▶

>>45953354 #

I think this can be fine if the header provides a clean abstraction with well-defined behaviour in C, effectively an EDSL. For an extreme example, it starts looking like a high-level language:

https://www.libcello.org/

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Giving C a superpower: custom header file (safe_c.h)